My mother, Molly Burkett, who has died aged 93, was a writer, wildlife rehabilitator and indefatigable campaigner. Over more than six decades she combined public service, activism and storytelling with the practical business of rescuing animals and people who had fallen through the cracks.
From the 1950s onwards, in parallel with her professional career as a teacher and educational psychologist, Molly developed what became one of Britain’s longest-running private wildlife rehabilitation centres, based at first in Hampshire, and later in Lincolnshire. After marrying John Burkett, an engineer, in 1954, she had begun caring for sick and injured birds and animals at home, work that eventually involved hundreds of creatures at any one time. At first, they lived in a caravan at Lasham airfield, where John was working on the Blue Streak rocket for De Havilland. They later settled near Alton and in 1969, with the help of the RSPCA, moved to Hough-on-the Hill in Lincolnshire.
